Judge OKs $4.5 million deal over rape conviction

September 06, 2008

HAMMOND (AP) -- A federal court has approved a $4.5 million settlement between city officials and a Gary man who spent nearly 20 years in prison for a rape conviction before he was freed because of DNA testing. U.S. Magistrate Judge Paul Cherry on Tuesday threw out a 2006 federal jury award of $9 million to Larry Mayes, paving the way for the settlement. A federal appeals court in Chicago ruled last month that it would accept Cherry's decision on the reduced settlement agreement. "The settlement will be concluded shortly and the long journey will be over," Hammond Corporation Counsel Joseph O'Connor said Thursday. Mayes, now 58, was found guilty by a Lake County jury in 1982 of raping a convenience store clerk during an armed robbery. He later won a new trial and was released from prison in 2001 after 21-year-old DNA evidence failed to conclusively link him to the crime. The victim in the 1980 case identified Mayes in a lineup and provided investigators with other physical details leading to his conviction. Mayes' lawyers argued the city failed to properly train detectives to investigate rape cases and assemble suspect identification lineups. Mayes originally had sought $19 million in damages and legal fees from the city. Both sides agreed to the $4.5 million settlement this year, and the City Council in April approved selling a judgment bond to pay for it, pending the court's decision. Another man convicted along with Mayes for the robbery and rape spent 17 years in prison for the crimes. He filed preliminary paperwork in Lake County court this summer for a possible lawsuit of his own.